To the Parents of New UW-Green Bay Students: I would like to welcome you to our university community! We are pleased that your son or daughter has selected UW-Green Bay to continue their education, and we look forward to the opportunity to work with you as partners to assure your favorite freshman’s success. I am writing today to encourage you to continue to play an active role in your son or daughter’s life while he or she is here at UW-Green Bay. I particularly ask your assistance as it involves the influence that you can have regarding your son or daughter’s decision about alcohol use during the college years. College is a turning point in the relationship between a parent/guardian and their son or daughter. It is a time when both parties are letting go of traditional and comfortable roles and redefining those roles for the future. This is a natural part of the transition that occurs from high school to college and it is usually an exciting and highly anticipated time, as it marks a rite of passage into adulthood. During this transition, your son or daughter will be asked to make all kinds of decisions that will impact his or her life in real and significant ways. One of these decisions is whether or not s/he will use alcohol during his or her college years. The statistics on alcohol related problems for college students are compelling and familiar to anyone who reads the newspaper or watches the news. Nationwide, there has been a significant increase in alcohol-related deaths and injuries among college-aged students. Other well- documented and undesirable effects of alcohol use include reduced class attendance, poor academic performance, and increased risk for being a victim of violence, including sexual assault. Finally, your son or daughter’s involvement in alcohol-related incidents can result in significant fines, messy legal problems, loss of driving privileges, and/or eviction from campus housing. At UW-Green Bay, as at most colleges, first-year students are most at risk for these problems because as young adults living in an independent setting for the first time, first-year students are particularly challenged by peer pressure and a desire to experiment with behaviors that they associate with their newly acquired status of adulthood. In writing to you about alcohol use and abuse, we are asking you to join the efforts of our campus and the University of Wisconsin System to affect changes in college life where the use of alcohol may be involved. We are specifically asking you to have an open and honest conversation with your son or daughter about the place of alcohol in his or her life, especially once they arrive at UW-Green Bay. We encourage this to be an ongoing discussion that you have with your son or daughter during their freshman year, as you join us in communicating what I hope are our shared expectations for students; that they will abide by the law and campus policies, behave responsibly, and maintain personal and community safety. I want you to know that we care very much about your son or daughter’s success at UW-Green Bay. We are committed to the goal of creating an environment that promotes wellness, discourages substance abuse, and offers assistance to students who have become harmfully involved. We seek to encourage the responsible use of alcohol by those students who are of legal age and choose to drink. But I want you and your son or daughter to understand that the University will not protect any student from the legal consequences of misusing alcohol or violating the law. Finally, a word about our policy with regard to contacting parents. Because we believe that college students are young adults and should be learning how to be personally responsible for their own lives and choices, we usually work directly with them. It is not our practice to contact parents unless the sharing of a problem is necessary to protect the student or others from serious harm, or it is part of a comprehensive plan to deal with recurrent alcohol-related problem behavior. In the event that your son or daughter has violations of the student conduct code that are serious and/or frequent, we will discuss with the student the possibility of sharing the information with their parents. In the case of critical medical or personal emergencies, parents will be contacted with or without the student’s knowledge. Please understand that we are working to balance the student’s legal right to privacy with a parent’s legitimate desire to know about the safety and well-being of their son or daughter, all within a complex and changing legal environment. If you establish a rapport and an open dialogue with your son/daughter before a crisis necessitates it, however, you can greatly facilitate problem resolution, should the need arise. Though they are no longer children or adolescents, traditional-aged college students are not yet adults. They are young people on the road to adulthood. Working together, we must insist that they obey the rules of the road. Otherwise, they may be seriously impaired when they reach their destination. Or they may not reach it at all. We humbly ask for your assistance with this important dimension of your son or daughter’s transition to college. I am delighted to have your son or daughter join us for what we hope will be some of the greatest years of their life. I encourage you to share your concerns, comments and suggestions with me or with others on the Dean of Students staff. I look forward to seeing you in August! Sincerely, Sue L. Keihn Associate Provost for Student Affairs and Dean of Students